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PhyreEngine & the future of linux gaming

I recently came across a few articles relating to Sony's new open source, cross platform gaming engine called PhyreEngine. Supposedly the point here is, as I understand it from limited knowlegde, to provide an abstraction layer so to speak between game code and the two big graphics libraries around, namely DirectX & OpenGL. allowing games to be written once for PS3 and simply recompiled to run under Xbox/Windows.

Obviously though - if the games can be compiled to use OpenGL, and that the engine is free to use & open source, it's tempting to believe games written this way could simply be compiled to run under mac, linux & other *nix environment just as easily.

I was a bit surprised no one in the linux gaming forums, or anywhere in phoronix's news articles, was this mentioned.

So I wondered what everybody else thought about that, if it could really spring up a new era in Linux gaming.. ??

Well, what would be interesting would be if there was more than just the GDC coverage right at the moment. Info on the PhyreEngine is a bit sparse otherwise (though it makes me wish I could have had budget to be there this year...).

i thought OS portability was the whole point; also, while info is rather sparse I remember reading that already three PS3 titles had been developed using it. So if thats the case then surely it's in a usable state already.

Heh... It might be in a 'usable state'- but can we source code to the engine, or will we see those three come available on Linux? That remains to be seen. I'm liking what I'm seeing, but it's not enough to make press releases.

Well, it seems it's not QUITE so open as people were implying it might be- it's looking more like hype than reality. Might be the future- but the truth be known, Ogre, Crystal Space, and to at least some extent Torque is. Indie stuff's where the future of gaming in general is and unless Sony's ONLY requiring that you register for the PS3 dev rel account and MAYBE do a PS3 version, it won't be taken up by the indie crowd, whereas the others would be.